Ahead of the Sunday meeting between the presidents of Serbia and Kosovo, the chiefs of the Belgrade and Pristina negotiating teams will continue a technical part of the dialogue in Brussels on Friday, with pessimism looming over the event.
The EU facilitator in this part of the talks, expected to last two days, will be Angelina Eichhors, the director for Western Balkans in the European External Action Service (EEAS), the Belgrade media reported.
They also said the agenda would include all open issues related to the agreements reached so far.
The talks’ aim to prepare the meeting between Aleksandar Vucic of Serbia and Hashim Taci of Kosovo, the first one at such high level since March 23.
The Sunday concurrence is expected to be a breakthrough in the process that has been put on hold since March after the arrest of Serbia’s official in Kosovo who went there without Pristina’s approval and the following bitter exchange of mutual accusations between the two capitals.
However, a new sound of pessimism could be heard from both sides ahead of what many see as a crucial weekend for both Belgrade and Pristina.
Vucic even said he had considered not to go to Brussels telling reporters there was no need for talks if Pristina was not ready for a compromise. He later confirmed he would attend the meeting after all.
Serbian chief negotiator and Office for Kosovo and Metohija Director, Marko Djuric told RTS he expects nothing from the forthcoming talks, since Pristina is ready “neither for compromise nor for dialogue.”
On the other side, Kosovo technical delegation’s chief and Thaci’s advisor Avni Arifi, who refused previous EU invitation to take part in a meeting on the Community of Serb Municipalities (CSM) issue in Brussels earlier this month, said on Thursday he did not expect anything from the new talks between the two presidents.
“There were different expectations last time, and the meeting went badly. I expect nothing. I do not believe there will be anything good,” Arifi said.
The last technical part of the dialogue was held on March 19-21, without any progress, according to the EU’s statement.
The reason for the failure is believed to be in the fact that Pristina insists that the issues of energy and joint border control top the agenda, while Belgrade wants the CSM, that has been pending for three years, is dealt with first.
On a general political side, the obstacles seem to be even harder to overcome. Kosovo’s leaders say the only solution is mutual recognition, the definition of states’ borders and the seat in the United Nations for Pristina, what is precisely what Belgrade says will never agree to.
